Google Power - from "Penguin" update to CISPA security bill
Another Google search algorithm update, another set of implications:
Petition: Google: Please kill your Penguin update
With the recent Google Penguin update, it has become nearly impossible for small content based websites to stay competitive with large publishers like eHow, WikiHow, Yahoo Answers and Amazon.
Countless webmasters have seen their livelihoods vanish overnight. ...
Have you noticed any great outcry in law/policy circles at this re-intermediation, as a potential threat to innovation? Any worry over the immense power vested in the whims of a single company, about what it might all mean for Freedom And The Internet? There's not much to be heard over the sounds of backscratching.
While it's definitely possible to go too far into seeing Google everywhere, one also shouldn't go too far in the other direction either, and pretend there's no economy of influence. Though I've basically given up on writing about the search algorithm implications myself. The SEO world knows all about it, they live it, they don't need to have it rehashed. The "connected" law/policy quasi-lobbyists don't want to know about it, ranging from unconcerned to actively hostile. For the remaining groups, well, we see how much notice is garnered by petitions like the above.
And the attention-driving aspect is further shown by articles over the battle about a "cyber-security" bill called CISPA: Why is Silicon Valley silent on CISPA?
In January, America's major tech companies joined everyday internet users to break the back of a reviled law called SOPA. Months later, Washington is brewing a new law that alarms many SOPA opponents — but this time the same companies have been quiet as church mice.
We put in calls about the vote to some of our Silicon Valley sources and the response has been nothing but crickets. Silence from Google. Ditto from Facebook. ....
Just a few months ago, the net was marinated in tales of how the evil SOPA-ians quaked before The Power Of Google, *cough*, I mean, The People. About how laws which threaten The Business Model Of Google, *cough*, I mean Civil Liberties, could no longer stand in the New Era. Fate gives us these little parallels to show how much that was all manipulation and feeding the masses delusions of significance. I have to grant that the end result of the SOPA battle did pass my test of being a positive outcome on civil-liberties (end-vs-means wouldn't be a difficult question if the "ends" view had nothing on its side). But it seems that's almost more accident than design.
Unfortunately, the only powerful faction making any of these points is the big media companies, who are Google's opponents, but not my friends or, perhaps more relevantly, patrons. While I don't want to be an unpaid Google lobbyist, it's even less appealing to be an unpaid media company flack.
Pew Research Center: The Future of Apps and Web
Backscratch: The Future of Apps and Web
A Pew Internet/Elon University survey reveals that experts expect apps and the Web to converge in the cloud; but many worry that simplicity for users will come at a price.
Again, I was one of the "experts" who took part in the survey, and have been quoted.
The apps approach to accessing information on the Internet is perceived as "closed," while the traditional Web paradigm is seen as "open." "I wish it weren't true, but the history of enclosure, centralization, and consolidation makes me very pessimistic about the open Web winning over the closed apps," observed Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer Award winner Seth Finkelstein. "There will always be a Web, but it may end up like the imagery of a person standing on a soapbox, referred to more for its romantic symbolism than mattering in reality."
And that was indeed what I said in total.
The choose-one question started:
In 2020, the World Wide Web is stronger than ever in users' lives. The open Web continues to thrive and grow as a vibrant place where most people do most of their work, play, communication, and content creation. ....
[vs]
In 2020, most people will prefer to use specific applications (apps) accessible by Internet connection to accomplish most online work, play, communication, and content creation. ...
I know that the first reaction would be to say it's not either/or. But I think it'll eventually end up as dominant/trivial. Consider someone asking "By 1950, most transportation involves internal combustion engines, versus riding horses" (for simplicity, let's skip bicycles). Now, there's still places in the US where people ride horses. And vacation areas where one can go horse-riding for recreation. But there was a shift from primarily using horses to cars, even if horses didn't vanish 100%.
Or maybe a better analogy is like farming vs big agriculture. For almost all of the US, food comes from the supermarket. Yes, there's niche home gardening. Or even a fad for raising backyard chickens. But that's a hobby. It's not quite illegal to consume raw milk from a cow. But it's considered kind of primitive, and perhaps dangerously unsanitary. I sadly suspect the open Web is going to have that sort of feel to it in the future.
